Unit 1: What’s your name? 21
and is the form we look at to determine the gender. Most nouns in this
unit are in the nominative case. Журна�л, фами�лия, тури�ст, а�дрec
are examples of nouns in the nominative case.
Э�тo and вот are followed by nouns in the nominative case:
Вот маши�на
‘Here is the car’.
The nominative case is also used after ‘am’, ‘are’, ‘is’ when these words
are omitted in Russian:
Я aнглича�нин
‘I am an Englishman’.Prepositional case
Following a preposition a noun will no longer be in the nominative case
and its ending will probably change. The preposition which appears
in this unit is в, meaning ‘in’. It is followed by the prepositional case
although other prepositions in Russian may be followed by other cases
such as the accusative or the genitive. The ending for most nouns in
the prepositional case in the singular is -e. Nouns ending in a conso-
nant add -е after the final letter: центр ‘centre’; в це�нтре ‘in the centre’.
Nouns ending in a vowel and masculine nouns ending in -ь change the
final letter to -е: Москва� ‘Moscow’; в Москве� ‘in Moscow’; Кремль
‘the Kremlin’; в Кремле� ‘in the Kremlin’. Note that in Russian ‘on the
plane’ is в самолёте.
Упражне�ние 6 / Exercise 6
Using the following words, answer the question: Где тури�ст?
For example:
Где тури�ст? Тури�ст в Москве�.1 Ло�ндон
2 гости�ница
3 университе�т
4 центр
5 самолёт